Coincidentally I had been putting on episodes from seasons 1-3 in the weeks leading up to the announcement of season five.

After finding out that five picks up where four left off I read through the episode summaries of four on Wikipedia, which was helpful because I barely remembered anything about it and didn't feel like watching the new cut of it.

I'm most of the way through five and it left me with kind of the same impression of season four. There are some nice call backs, the play on words is still top notch, and the rapid narrative is still there, but all the charm is gone (save for Tobias). George-Michael and Maeby seem pretty extraneous, and the whole deal where characters keep bumping into each other in Mexico or wherever (which now seems funny as I type it) kept taking me out of the moment.

I'll finish it and probably go back and watch the remix of four, but seasons 1-3 definitely are definitely more to my tastes. Still glad they went ahead and made it though.